Some 6 and a bit years ago my other half Ste decided to cut his losses / make an honest woman of me and proposed very early one snowy morning in New York.

Though I was thrilled about the engagement, I approached the planning side of things with great trepidation. I’d never even organised a birthday party before, so the thought of organising the biggest party of my life, with everyone I know and love invited, terrified me ever so slightly. So much so, it look me a good 18 months to start thinking about it and 3 ½ years to actually get it arranged (no fear of a shotgun wedding there).

My approach to tackling this fear of orchestrating large social gathering was a bit like my approach to essays at university: research it like crazy, and then collate all the best ideas from various sources, repackage it and present it as my own work (nb. not a recommended academic strategy but good for wedding planning).

We had a brilliantly awesome wedding day on 25^th June 2011 (and luckily a very talented photographer to capture it).

As well as being left with very happy memories, I was also left with a ton of research, wedding resources, and lots of great ideas that I didn’t use (it being a rather DIY affair).   Though it’s 2 and a half years hence, its still pretty relevant, so I thought I’d dig it out of my hard drive, dust it off and share it in a series of posts for anyone out there that might be thinking of tying the knot.